Australia is the world’s largest exporter of chickpeas, with 98% of the crop going overseas.
Photograph: Southern Stock/Getty Images/Brand X

Australian chickpea farmers are celebrating an exceptional end to 2016 as record prices and surging demand round off the UN’s aptly designated international year of the pulse.

Prices for Australian chickpeas reached $1,250 a tonne last week after farmers had planted a record-breaking million hectares across Queensland and New South Wales.

Pulse trader Rob Brealey told the ABC in July that the price surge was spurred by disappointing harvests on the subcontinent. “The cupboard is bare in terms of India and Pakistan,” he said.

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Australia sends 98% of its chickpeas overseas, making it the world’s largest exporter of the popular legume. They primarily flow to India, which in 2015 bought 80% of the total crop.

Prices have steadily risen through India’s substandard production year, although the country remains the world’s largest producer of chickpeas. In April, prices were $880 per tonne and have only risen since.

Chickpea farmer Barry Baker told the Australian he considered this year’s harvest his “best crop ever”.